PROSPECTUS

OF

A SERIES OF NEW WORKS,

ENTITLED THE

AMERICAN LIBRARY OF HISTORY;

NOW PUBLISHING BY

COLLINS & HANNAY AND W. E. DEAN.

Of all the numberless improvements which distinguish our age, there is none more remarkable, and more widely beneficial in its influence, than the introduction of a cheap popular literature for the use of those whose occupations or means deny them access to the larger and more expensive works which alone were thought worthy, but a short time ago, of the labours of the closet or the honours of the press. Among the bigh merits of the most enlightened statesman of his generation, is noted the creation of this valuable instrument of moral and intellectual advancement; and the name of Brougham is associated in some manner with more than half of the publications which, at reduced prices, are now finding their way into houses in which the luxury of reading was, but a few years before, confined to a single book, or entirely unknown. In America, the advantages of such a literature must be strikingly apparent when we reflect that the only recognized distinction among us is the distinction of merit, and the only inferiority of the lowest orders, is an inferiority of knowledge occasioned by the difficulty or the impossibility of its attainment.

Within a very recent period efforts have been made by enterprising publishers to reproduce here, for the benefit of their countrymen, the works of English writers in this new and most useful department of letters. To these efforts the public have corresponded in such a man. ner as to testify their full appreciation of the service, and of the intrin sic excellence of the design. The "Family Library," the "Cabinet Cyclopædia," the "The Cabinet of History," with several others devised to the same end, and in the same spirit, have vindicated by their success the efficacy and the merit of the plan; and if the public spirited projectors in this country have in some measure reaped the fruit of their risk and their labour, they have but received the just reward of a public benefaction.

Yet with all the excellences of the many works now offered to the world, with the laudable desire to extend among the poor and the young the advantages of education and knowledge, it appeared to the Proprietors that something still remained to be done; something without which the contemplated work of improvement could never be complete. The tone of even liberal writers in England cannot be expected to come up to that standard which in the United States would be required to harmonize with the character of our institutions; but it is a fact, which will not be denied, that of those very writers, whose

PART I.-1

literary eminence entitles them to a reprint in this country, the greater imbibe. It cannot be desirable that the early notions of those who verse of those which, as Americans, we should desire our children to number are of that class who inculcate opinions and doctrines the retions of this kind, should receive them coloured with the prejudices of will derive their principal stock of general knowledge from publicaprepossessions opposed to those which the interests of this republic writers who have grown up in the midst of institutions, habits, and tical and moral revolutions should be shaped by the opinions of men require in its citizens, or that their sentiments in regard to great poli. who have formed their own conceptions of things on the data presentunable to concede their due authority to the influence of American hised to them by the history of the old world, and who are unwilling or tory, American manners, and American institutions.

To supply the desideratum, which the best collections have thus left, their prosent enterprise; and they offer their series, "THE AMERICAN in our cheap and popular literature, the Proprietors have embarked in LIBRARY OF HISTORY," with a full conviction, that if the execution of the several works shall merit the public approbation, they will not fail to receive that patronage upon which the success of their experiment must depend. The peculiar characteristics of this publication will make themselves manifest in its name; and the Proprietors conceive that they have already sufficiently justified, in their reasons set forth above, the admission of American productions alone into their collection. In confining themselves to Historical subjects exclusively, they also believe that they are best consulting the wants and wishes of the community, inasmuch as all the publications of this kind which have preceded theirs, have been miscellaneous in their nature, and have nothing in their character to constitute a series, with the exception of the uniformity of their outward appearance. By the means now proposed, it is obvious that works which are not calculated to promote the ends of general knowledge will not by any accident find a place in their list; and that when their series shall have embraced the history of nations, or when it shall, in other words, have come to constitute a cheap and popular universal history, it will be brought to a termination. The lives of individuals, as being too limited in their bearings, will not be considered as possessing historical value, unless their history be the history of their times. Indeed, it must be evident, that if the biography of individuals can be admitted, the series cannot be brought to a close until the life of every illustrious character shall have had its separate The life of Wickliffe, of Alexander the Great, of Mahomet, of Buonaparte, is history; the lives of Nelson and Belisarius, are me moir and biography.

tribute.

In regard to their plan, the Proprietors need only observe in conclusion, that it will be their aim to furnish, in the works which they are now about to offer to the Public, an historical library, sufficiently detailed for all the purposes of the general reader, and in a form sufficiently attractive to engage his interest and secure his attention. The numbers already in preparation are:

A HISTORY OF THE TURKISH EMPIRE IN EUROPE;

A HISTORY OF FLORENCE;

A HISTORY OF THE NORTHERN NATIONS OF EUROPE; and

A HISTORY OF PERSIA;

upon which some of the ablest writers of our country have employed their pens. The editorial department of the publication is entrusted to the charge of LORENZO L. DA PONTE, Professor of Italian Literature in the University of the City of New-York, from whom the Proprietors feel confident in assuring the Public it will meet with a faithful attention and assiduous care.

OR,

A DICTIONARY

OF ALL

THE PRINCIPAL NAMES AND TERMS

RELATING TO THE

GEOGRAPHY, TOPOGRAPHY, HISTORY, LITERATURE,
AND MYTHOLOGY

OF

ANTIQUITY AND OF THE ANCIENTS.

WITH

A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE.

By J. LEMPRIERE, D. D.

EIGHTH AMERICAN EDITION,

REVISED AND corrected, and divided, under separaTE HEADS,
INTO THREE PARTS:

W. E. DEAN, PRINTER, 70 FRANKFORT-STREET.

COLLINS AND HANNAY; COLLINS AND CO.; AND N. AND J. WHITE.

M.DCCC.XXXIII.